Md Riaz. Photo: Collected

By Syed Altefat Hossain

DHAKA, Jan 11, 2025 (BSS) – “Please, pray for me” were the last words of Md Riaz, a 26- year-old rod mechanic, to his minor daughter before leaving his home to join the historic “March to Dhaka Programme” on August 5 under the banner of anti-discrimination student movement.

The movement succeeded in ousting the nearly 16 years of autocracy, but Riaz never returned home, nor he could witness the victory of the cause he fought for as he was tragically shot dead, just hours before the movement succeeded in toppling the regime.

Thus, a devoted father was fatally shot dead around 11am in the city’s Jatrabari area as along with thousand others, Riaz attempted to break through police barricades.

“Before leaving the house, my husband went to our youngest daughter, five-year-old Fariya, and told her, “Abbu is going to the procession. Please, pray for me”, Riaz’s distraught wife Farzana Begum (25) recalled the poignant moments before his departure.
 
She was talking to this correspondent at her father’s residence in the Saddam Market area of Jatrabari’s Matuail area recently.
 
Farzana said after returning home from the movement on August 4, Riaz told her that he would join the march next morning.
 
“I tried to stop him, reminding him of our two daughters’ future,” she said with a heavy heart, adding that her husband showed his determination to join the march and told her, “Don’t worry. Nothing will happen to me”.
 
“Even if I embrace martyrdom, I will carry my NID card. So, people will easily identify and send my body to you. Please, pardon me,” Farzana recounted her husband’s determination in an emotion-chocked voice.
 
“As I reacted strongly at that time, he told me that he would not go to the march programme; rather will go to work,” Farzana thought that Riaz had reconsidered her plea.
 
Therefore, she called him at 7:47 am to wake him for work. But instead of heading to his job, Farzana recalled, her husband took his NID card, his company ID, and photocopies of Farzana’s parents’ NID cards and left the house leaving his phone behind after asking his daughter Fariya to pray for him.
 
She, however, tried to locate Riaz around 10am at his workplace hoping that he might have changed his decision of joining the movement.
 
Thus, Farzana sent her brother-in-law to Riaz’s workplace, but he wasn’t there.
 
The news of Sheikh Hasina’s resignation and fleeing the country, however, had ignited a hope in Farzana that her husband would return soon. But she did not realize that the worst news was waiting for her.
 
“Hearing the news of Sheikh Hasina’s resignation in the afternoon, I went to Rayerbag area hoping that I would find my husband there with the cheerful people,” Farzana said, adding, she returned home from Rayerbag as she did not find him there.

“Soon after, I received the devastating news.

My mother-in-law called me and said my husband’s lifeless body was kept in the Jatrabari area near the police station. At first, I couldn’t believe it. Therefore, I asked her “How did you know from Bhola whereas I don’t know anything, staying in Dhaka?” Farzana said in a sobbing tone.

Her mother-in-law replied that they were confirmed by a viral Facebook post showing Riaz’s lifeless body with his NID card placed on his chest.

“Later, my father, brothers and brother-in-law went to Jatrabari and received the body from in front of Jatrabari Ideal School and College while we laid him to eternal rest at our family graveyard in Doulatkhan Upazila of Bhola district on August 6,” grieving Farzana said.

Riaz’s death left his wife, daughters, 8-year-old Bibi Fatema and 5-year-old Fariya, and his family in the village in an unimaginable hardship as he was the only breadwinner of both the families in the city and village home.

With no source of income, Farzana is now living with her father, Md Farid, in a small shanty in Jatrabari’s Saddam Market area in the city while Farid himself, a vegetable vendor, is struggling to support his extended family of now eight, including his daughter and granddaughters.
 
“As we are from a poor family, it is not possible to live with all family members in a shanty at the village.

 Therefore, we have been living in Dhaka while my husband was running the family working as a rod mechanic,” Farzana said.
 
Farzana tearfully expressed anxiety over her uncertain future and said, “I have no scope to live independently. If the government could arrange a permanent shelter for my two daughters, it would greatly benefit us”.

Besides, Riaz was the backbone of his extended family in the village home too. His father, Abdur Rahman, has been bedridden and paralyzed for 15 years, while his two younger brothers, Md Arif (16) and Md Sajib (11), are too young to support themselves.
 
Riaz’s mother Mst Ranu Moni Begum (45), who is living in the village home in Bhola, said as her husband is paralyzed, Riaz used to contribute to their family and now they are managing their livelihood by begging.
 
“It is embarrassing to admit that since my son’s death, I have been begging with my bedridden husband on a wheelchair at door to door of the people.

 Our teenage two sons are too young to support us,” Riaz’s grieving mother told BSS over phone.

Riaz’s widow Farzana demands trial for her husband’s death and the countless others who lost their lives during the movement.

“My daughters lost their father at such a young age. No amount of money or gifts from uncles or grandfathers can replace him. I want capital punishment of the killers,” she said with an emotion-choked voice.

Farzana demanded capital punishment of autocratic ruler Sheikh is mainly responsible for mass killing during the July movement.